This invention relates to the printers and more particularly to networked printers.
In our co-pending application U.S. Ser. No. 09/722,142 we have proposed a system in which a printer is connected to a network and users of the printer subscribe to publications, such as newspapers and magazines, which may be personalized for each subscriber. The publications are printed automatically on the printer. The system may also be used for other actions, such as banking and purchasing. A system is proposed in which the user does not pay all or any of the costs of the printer supplies and/or publications. Instead the cost of the publication and/or any supplies is partially or totally covered by advertising incorporated in documents printed.
In one broad form the invention provides in a system in which a user obtains documents, a method of controlling what is supplied to the user, the method including:
providing one or more user accounts for the user and providing the or each user account with a separate first threshold;
periodically determining the balance in the user account or accounts; and
if the balance in the respective user account is below the first threshold, instituting one or both of the following:
modification of documents supplied;
restrictions on what documents are supplied.
The documents may be supplied electronically or by printing. Where the documents are printed, preferably the documents are printed on a user owned or user controlled printer.
The net value of each document may be positive, negative, or zero.
The restriction on documents supplied may extend to all documents, negative value documents or negative and zero value documents.
The restrictions may remain until the relevant account is above a second threshold. The second threshold may be the same as the first threshold or it may be higher.
The net value may be derived from any one or more of the following: paper cost; ink cost; adhesive cost; binding cost; data transmission cost; publisher cost; advertising credits; time of printing; day of printing; user demographics; post history or an arbitrary value.
Each user may have more than one account. Where the user has access to more than one printer there may be a separate account for each printer. Alternatively, the user may have a single account for all printers. In a further alternative, multiple accounts may be provided with one or more printers for some or all of the accounts.
Electronic delivery of documents may have a separate account or may be combined with a printer account.
The documents may be modified so as to increase the net value of some or all of the documents. Examples include adding advertising to documents which normally do not carry advertising or by increasing the ratio of advertising. The advertising ratio may be increased by increasing the amount of advertising or by decreasing the amount of not advertising material or both. The net value may be increased in other ways, such as by reducing image quality, which reduced transmission costs.